Day 65
   
   7/01/01
   Talkeetna, AK
   
   I awoke at the same time as the other rope team, and we all got up and
   made an abbreviated morning of it; no breakfast or melting water,
   since it was only a few hours of hauling sleds to Base Camp.  One of the
   members was having a psychologically hard time of it, which I,
   standing at the back of the rope as I was, found quite humorous.  In his 
   mind, the climb was over, and he desperately wanted to be sitting in a 
   motel bar sipping wine.  He just couldn't seem to stay energized, asking for
   rest periods every fifteen minutes, when we all knew there was no real
   problem - on top of which, we were now in air with a whole lot more
   oxygen in it.  I laughed as the few remaining miles to Base Camp turned into
   one of those "Zeno's Paradox" math problems - you know the one, where
   you travel half of the distance to your destination in time X, and then
   half of the remaining distance also in the same amount of time X, and
   then half of that distance...so you never actually get all the way there.
   When we came over the last rise, with Base Camp *right there*,
   and he wanted to take a break, I practically busted a gut laughing.
   
   But when we finally pulled into Base Camp, lo and behold, there was
   Mike.  So the ranger had been wrong, and Mike had been there all
   along.
   
   The hard part was over, and it was gravy from here on.
   
   We waited several hours at base camp for a ski-plane to be dispatched
   for transport back to town, cooking up a little food, and hanging out.
   The snow had gotten softer, and ride off the glacier was punctuated by
   the pilot "bouncing" the plane into the air.
   
   And so we departed the Land of White to return to the Land of Green,
   flying across snowfields and between jagged peaks until trees and
   grass began to appear.  We touched down, taxied to a stop, and dumped onto
   the pavement our gear which was now of no importance to us save for the
   fact that it had cost us a lot of money.
   
   We were in no mood to sort through it all, so we decided to go into
   town for a decent (as opposed to dehydrated) meal and kick back for a while
   in the low-elevation air that, by comparison, was thick as soup.  At
   the West Rib Pub, we scarfed down salmon burgers and fries while we
   talked back and forth, putting the past few weeks into perspective.
   Other climbers were here too, sitting around telling their own tales of
   mountaineering, most of which were along the lines of, "So there I
   was, at 20,000 feet, when...."
   
   Circumstance may differ, but we human beings are all pretty much cut
   from the same mold.  Chances are, they'll still be spinning the same
   yarns when they are residents at the Rock of Ages Retirement Home for
   Old Climbers.
   
   As likely will I.  But the future is not to be feared; one cannot hide
   from  the shadow of what might be.  It's essential to plan for the
   future, but living in it denies us the present - a mistake I made too
   often in my earlier years.  That time will come for me, true.
   
   But not today.

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